COVID-19 crisis

We urgently need your help to slow the spread of COVID-19 and its impact on the most vulnerable children and their communities.

What if social distancing was impossible? What if total lockdown meant starvation? What if finding soap and water put you further at risk? What would you do? ​

We need your help to slow the spread of this pandemic.​

The children, families and communities we work with are among the most vulnerable in the world. Often suffering from preventable diseases, frequently hungry and malnourished, often living in cramped conditions and almost always without adequate healthcare if they fall sick.

As COVID-19 continues to spread to countries where we are working, the impact will be much worse than what we are seeing now.​

You are keeping the most vulnerable children and communities safe.

Protecting vulnerable children

We are providing support and protection to children made vulnerable by COVID-19. Preventing the separation or stigmatisation of children during treatment and isolation; providing psychological first aid; and supporting livelihood activities and cash, food, and care packs to people in isolation.

Supporting healthcare systems

We are supporting local healthcare systems by training and equipping community healthcare workers and volunteers. Providing personal protective equipment such as masks and gowns and diagnostic supplies such as thermometers.

Promoting preventative measures

We are partnering with community healthcare workers and volunteers, promoting preventive measures to stop or slow the spread of COVID-19. Working together to set up public handwashing stations, and distributing soap, sanitiser, and masks appropriately.

Children whose caregivers get sick or die will be at higher risk of malnutrition, diseases, death, abuse and exploitation.

Parents and older adults are at risk of dying from COVID-19. Grandparents, who may be at the highest risk of dying from COVID-19 and have underlying health concerns, often serve as important caregivers of young children in poorer countries.

When parents and grandparents die, children are sometimes left to fend for themselves and are vulnerable to many forms of violence, abuse and exploitation, including forced sex.

When family members are sick and cannot work or put food on the table, children are also put at a higher risk of malnutrition, diarrhoea, pneumonia, and other killer diseases. Children will need special support, including psycho-social, during and after this crisis.

The spread of COVID-19 is likely to have a huge impact on the poorest, and global efforts to defeat poverty.

As countries and communities respond to the virus by closing schools and places of work and imposing quarantines, along with people limiting public interaction, it is children and the very poor who will be greatly impacted. Any loss of work for those who survive on minimal earnings will have a devastating impact on household incomes where people survive from day to day. The price of food and goods is also likely to rise as shortages emerge and people begin to hoard supplies. The very poorest won’t be able to stock up in the same way and the loss of earnings will make it very hard for them to feed their children. The situation could go on for weeks or months.

The impact of the virus will make it more difficult for the world to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 1 which has as its target that less than 3 percent of the world people would be living in extreme poverty by 2030.

Countries with weak healthcare systems or with large numbers of displaced people are most at risk from COVID-19 and need support from the international community with funding and healthcare expertise.

Without support from countries with robust healthcare systems and resources, the world’s poorest people will remain at higher risk of contracting COVID-19 and outbreaks may prove especially devastating. Without that support, the disease will also be more likely to spread to more and more places.

The COVID-19 mortality rate is likely to be higher in countries where there is a lack of hospitals and health centres and where healthcare facilities are poorly equipped with diagnostic kits, isolation facilities and intensive care and respiratory equipment.

While higher-income countries have anywhere between 2 and 12 hospital beds per 1,000 population, in the poorest countries, there may be 1 bed per 10,000 people or less.

The COVID-19 mortality rate is also higher among patients with pre-existing health conditions. The prevalence of TB, pneumonia, malaria, HIV and AIDS in lower-income countries and high rates of malnutrition are cause for deep concern. In addition, in many countries, medical treatment is not free. The poorest will struggle to pay for healthcare which is then likely to be refused.

In the developing world, there are high numbers of refugees, displaced people, and people on the move who are especially vulnerable to the virus. Sub-Saharan Africa hosts more than 26% of the world’s refugee population with over 18 million people in this region declared to be people of concern to UNHCR (UN refugee agency). Countries in Africa, the Middle East, Latin America and Asia host very large settlements or camps of displaced people fleeing conflict and poverty. These emergencies include the Syrian conflict, displacements from South Sudan and within DR Congo, the Rohingya crisis and the Venezuela migration crisis. These populations are often living in unhygienic and overcrowded camps and settlements with limited access to medical care. Populations caught up in conflict are also on the move and difficult to reach or monitor for the virus. The risk of the virus spreading, if it gets into these vulnerable populations is very high and more robust interventions are required to help prevent this from happening.

Slow the spread of COVID-19 and its impact on the world’s most vulnerable children.